


In the Middle

by DisguisedasInnocent



Series: Ways to Say 'I love you' [72]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 13:13:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15143834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DisguisedasInnocent/pseuds/DisguisedasInnocent
Summary: After everything—after Reign, after her Mother, afterSam—Kara is left standing in the ashes of her relationship with Lena, and all she wants is to reach out and feel Lena reach back. Which is why Kara decides to meet Lena halfway, to reveal some of her own secrets, in an effort to repair the damage.





	In the Middle

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: "I'll meet you halfway."

“I said—” Supergirl paused and rocked forward onto the balls of her feet nervously “—that I don't like secrets, and then, then you asked me my real name and I didn't answer. I said that it wasn't a great question for a Luthor to ask someone in my family.”

“I remember.” Lena replied with a sigh and a shake of her head. “Why are you bringing it up now?”

“Because...” Supergirl bit her bottom lip before she slumped down into the soft white leather of Lena's office couch. “Because I want to meet you halfway.”

“Meet me halfway?” Lena lifted an eyebrow inquiringly as her eyes drifted across Supergirl's face appraisingly. The blonde-haired woman's face seemed tight and drawn, and her eyes shimmered with a soft lingering hurt that sent a spark of pain through Lena's chest.

“Yes.” Supergirl said, her voice soft and quiet but her eyes firm as she met Lena's gaze. “I'm going to tell you my name, my real name, and that is going to change a lot of things between you and me. But, I want you to know that I'm trusting you with something that in fourteen years I've only ever trusted to one person voluntarily—on my own terms—because I was told since the day I arrived that my identity would endanger the people around me, and it has. It... for lack of a better word... killed my foster-father.”

“I—” Lena paused and swallowed hard at the fierce pain that coated Supergirl's words. “I understand." 

Supergirl cocked her head to the side and let a soft smile cross her lips, “Perhaps you do.”

“What do you want in return for your name?” Lena murmured.

“I want you to listen to what I've got to say about Kryptonite.” Supergirl answered. “I'm not going to try to tell you what to do with it, not now, but I want you to listen to why it scares me.”

“All right.” Lena accepted with a soft shake of her head and a wave of her hand. “I'll listen.”

“Good.” Supergirl muttered in reply. Then, the Girl of Steel squared her shoulders and straightened her spine. “My name is Kara Zor-El. I am the daughter of Alura Zor-El, née In-Ze, and Zor-El of the House of El. I am... I am known on Earth by another name, Kara Danvers, because of the family that took me in when I arrived on Earth.”

“Kara...” Lena's voice wavered, and her entire body quivered in shock. The dark-haired woman's cheeks blanched suddenly as the weight of Kara's revelation settled itself onto her shoulders and battered at the walls that surrounded her heart. “I...”

“I didn't not tell you because you are a Luthor.” Kara said quietly. “I... I was selfish, and I’m so sorry for that. I had something, something special and good and _mine_ , and I wanted to keep you as mine for as long as I could. I wanted... I wanted you to see Kara, just Kara, and not the persona that Supergirl has had to become or the lies that Kara Danvers must embody. I just wanted to be Kara with you.”

“Kara...” Lena whispered the other woman's name quietly—sadly—as she watched one slow tear creep down the curve of Kara's cheek. “I didn't... How am I meant to believe you?”

“I've never lied to you Lena.” Kara vowed. “I avoided your questions, the ones that I couldn't answer without lying, but I've never once lied to you.”

“How could I have been so blind?” Lena muttered angrily.

“Because you trusted me.” Kara replied in a soft, gentle, tone. “Because, I gave you every reason to believe what I told you. I've had fourteen years, give, or take, to become Kara Danvers—harmless, but kind human Kara. It's a disguise, a conscious one, but it is familiar, and the Danvers ingrained it in me. I... I cost Alex her father by being Kryptonian, and I vowed, I promised her Lena, that I would never cost her anything by being Kryptonian again.”

“You...” Lena blinked in surprise as a powerful wave of sadness rippled through her. “You vowed not to be Kryptonian?”

“Yes.” Kara said with a soft chuckle. “And I broke my promise. I broke it so easily... Do you know why I revealed myself?”

“There was a plane...” Lena murmured quizzically as if surprised by the abrupt change of direction. “It was going to crash in the city.”

“No.” Kara shook her head. “That's not why.”

“It... isn't?” Lena's eyebrows furrowed sharply in confusion. “You caught a plane... I remember it was National—and International—news.”

“I didn't catch a plane because it was going to crash in the city.” Kara said quietly. “I caught a plane because Alex was on that plane. I caught it because... because I couldn't bear to know that she'd been hurt—or worse—when there was something that I could do about it.”

“You were selfish.” Lena whispered as she slumped back into her chair.

“So, so selfish.” Kara confirmed with a watery smile. “I thought… I told the world no. I told it that it couldn’t have Alex. I… I’ve lost so much Lena, but that time, because it was her, I told the world no… and I told it no when it came to you as well. I told it that this one thing, this one precious _perfect_ thing, would be _mine_.”

“I…” Lena’s voice crackled. “You… How am I meant to respond to that?”

“I…” Kara shook her head ruefully. “I didn’t tell you to make you feel guilty Lena. I fucked up—” that word, from Kara’s lips, shocked Lena more than she cared to admit “—and I know it. I just… I need you to understand.”

“Tell me about Kryptonite.” Lena said. “Make me understand. Please, Kara, make me understand why.”

“Kryptonite…” Kara tipped her head back and peered upward—vacant eyed and unseeing—at the ceiling of Lena’s office. “Kryptonite _burns_. It… It burrows into my skin, tearing and searing and agonising, and it itches like a thousand fire ants crawling through my veins. It… I want to gouge myself open because it feels like my blood is on fire. It is a hand around my throat, and a weight on my chest, squeezing until I can’t breathe.”

Lena flinched at the sheer imagery of Kara’s description and the aching pain that the blonde-haired woman’s words dripped with—a pain borne from experience and not just anecdotal. “It… I’m sorry Kara. I… I didn’t know.”

“Kryptonite… destroys Kryptonians Lena.” Kara whispered brokenly—her head bowed and her voice hollow. “It doesn’t just kill, it tears us apart cell by cell, from the inside. It is radiation poisoning times one thousand.”

“I…” Lena swallowed hard and hovered on the edge of her chair for half a second before she shoved herself to her feet and strode across the room to sit on the couch at Kara’s side. “I’m sorry Kara. I’m so sorry. I didn’t… I thought… I just needed a little more time to save Sam.”

Kara felt the couch dip underneath Lena’s weight and her heart lurched up her throat at the soft words that bubbled out from Lena’s lips. “I know.” The Kryptonian murmured. “I… I just… I wish you’d trusted me—trusted Supergirl—to want to help. I thought… I thought I’d shown you that I believed in you… with Medusa, with the Daxamites, with… with CADMUS.”

“You did.” Lena said. “I wasn’t… Sam’s my best friend Kara, she’s my rock and I couldn’t let her or Ruby down. I just… I had to buy some time.”

“I...” Kara shook her head and turned to offer Lena an understanding smile. “I understand.”

“I wouldn't—I won't—ever use Kryptonite against you Kara. I promise.” Lena vowed quietly as she reached out to curl her fingers around one of Kara's slender wrists. “I couldn't bear to knowingly hurt you.”

“I'm not afraid that you'll use it against me Lena.” Kara sighed even as she turned her wrist to tangle her fingers around Lena's hand. “I'm afraid that someone, like your Mother, will be able to use it—or you—against me. I'm... I'm afraid that if CADMUS learns that you can make synthetic Kryptonite they'll kidnap you, again, and I almost lost you last time Lena.”

Lena shuddered at the memory of Supergirl—Kara—on her knees, and her Mother's gleeful laughter. “You can't protect me from everything Kara.” Lena whispered as she squeezed Kara's hand. “I've got enough enemies of my own.”

“I just don't want my enemies to become your enemies.” Kara said, her quiet voice echoing in the silence of Lena's office, as she met Lena's gaze.

“They already are.” Lena replied. “And,” the dark-haired woman smiled, “your enemies are my enemies Kara.”

“I should have known that Lena Luthor's stubbornness wouldn't be tamed.” Kara chuckled. “Are we... Are we OK?”

“OK?” Lena tipped her head to the side to slide her eyes across Kara's face. She could see the hope shimmering in the depths of Kara's soft blue eyes, and she found that she couldn't be the one to squash that hope. “We're OK. I'm... I'm still hurt that you tried to have James investigate me Kara, but I think I understand why you're scared of where my research is, or was, heading.”

“Thank you.” Kara breathed out, and Lena watched as the Kryptonian's entire body seemed to lighten and lift as if a great weight had suddenly been lifted from her shoulders.

“So,” Lena murmured, “what do you say to going back to your apartment, ordering a truly inhuman number of potstickers, and watching a few Disney movies?”

“I think,” Kara began, and a soft warm smile spread across her lips, “that would be perfect.”


End file.
